The Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education (QAA), in partnership with the Association of Graduate Recruiters (AGR), is commissioning research into the impact of employability initiatives offered by universities and colleges to their students.
Recent QAA-funded research from King's College London identified that students' primary purpose in entering higher education was to improve their career prospects.
Almost all universities and colleges offer some form of employability initiatives to students, ranging from work-based or placement learning to mentoring, or extra-curricular award schemes. However, there is no comprehensive data about what is offered and no
broad-based analysis of what is effective in making graduates employable.
'We want to find out how universities and colleges across the UK are engaging with employers to help make their students employable, and, crucially, what works best,'
said Richard Jarman, Director of Public Engagement at QAA.
'I'm looking forward to the findings, which I'm sure will be both interesting and above all useful to the higher education sector and to employers themselves.
'AGR has great expertise in the area of graduate employability, so their involvement in this project is excellent,' he continued.
The project forms part of QAA's work to promote engagement with employers across the higher education sector, helping to strengthen their contribution to academic quality and standards. It will look across the diversity of higher education provision, including alternative providers and further education colleges.
Expressions of interest are being sought from individuals or organisations who would be interested in undertaking this work, and who have knowledge and experience of issues relating to graduate employability.
The findings will be publicly available and used to both inform QAA's work and to contribute to debates on policy and practice in higher education.
